About

I've lived all over the country, from Los Angeles to the Adirondack Mountains in New York, from Virginia to Austin, Texas, to Oregon. I've finally found home, in a 1950s farmhouse near Bellingham, Washington, complete with a barn and a silo and a slew of barn cats.

I homeschool my three kids: Sawyer, Sander and Scout. I should have named them something else, because I end up calling them all, "Sawyer/Sander/whatever your name is."

Sander had autism. He doesn't anymore. I write about that, too.

I had a hideous childhood as the oldest of four girls, and we had a wild ride of it, marked by insane parents, horrible events, lots and lots of moves and large stretches where we had a lot of fun. I'm doing my best to have a re-do of my childhood by giving my kids the one I wanted. They can go have their own later. And yeah, I write about that.

I am passionate about clean food, dirty politics, thoughtful, kind parenting, gardening, cooking, homeschooling and travel. I am, politics-wise, an unabashed liberal, though not always a democrat, and not always when it comes to money. I try to see both sides of everything. Unless you're just plain wrong.

I'm not easy. I'm not neat. I'm not always on time. I say what I think, though our family motto is, "Be kind," so I try to be nice about it.​ Well, that, plus I'm a big chicken, so I don't always really say what I think.

I channel Mrs. Weasley, Gloria Steinem and a dash of Scarlett O'Hara. I have red hair and an Irish temper and I am the messiest person I know.

My husband Mark is a patient, calm, logical engineer from Texas and I have no idea what he's doing with me. He wants to live in the middle of a city in a quiet condo. Instead, we have nine acres, three kids, a bunch of cats, chickens, goats and a dog. None of them listen. My family calls my husband Saint Mark. They're not far off.